


Hone Thy Craft

by japansace



Series: My Love, We Deserve the Softest Eternity [4]
Category: Yuri!!! on Ice (Anime)
Genre: + magic, Alternate Universe - Fantasy, Elves, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Prince Victor Nikiforov, author is soft, in which Yuuri and the only other mind talent play some 4D chess
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-20
Updated: 2019-12-20
Packaged: 2021-02-26 01:08:26
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,579
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21874921
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/japansace/pseuds/japansace
Summary: “Yuuri isn’t theonlymind talent… is he?”
Relationships: Katsuki Yuuri/Victor Nikiforov
Series: My Love, We Deserve the Softest Eternity [4]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1133426
Comments: 32
Kudos: 303





	Hone Thy Craft

**Author's Note:**

> This was meant to come out much sooner, but I was only aiming for 1-2K words, and it became this. Ah, well... I'm sure you all won't mind.
> 
> Ages:
> 
> Victor: 833  
> Yuuri: 793

It happens again, and Victor can only watch.

They go out to view the cherry blossoms in bloom, heavy and pink on their branches. They’re already falling a little—the petals flittering, twisting in the wind—and the scent of them is soothing like a balm, the sound of far off waves a complement, rolling in their ears.

Humans come upon them, their picnic: where they’ve lain their blanket, to sit in the shade and soak in the spring air.

It’s a sizeable group—a squadron, really. Knights rather than adventurers, with weapons at the ready, so Victor and Yuuri are weary from the start, following them across the field with keen eyes.

Then Yuuri is sent into a flinch, pressing fingers to his brow.

_Elves?_

_Elves._

_Elves—_

_Elves?_

_Elves!_

“Yuuri?”

“Go… Go away, please.” Yuuri’s voice is small, like it always is when this happens. “Tell them to go away.”

At once, Victor stands, folding his long sleeves before him. The fine art of intimidating humans is mostly presentation, looking a certain way and saying just enough to send their imaginations reeling. So he makes his way down the hill to the road and tells them, in no uncertain terms, that their presence is unwanted.

Warriors though they may be, humans usually have enough sense not to try an elf’s patience. Just the mere suggestion has them scrambling, all of them out of the range of Yuuri’s detection within the moment.

When Victor returns to Yuuri, the latter is breathing out a sigh of relief but visibly fatigued. “I’m sorry, Vitya, but… may we return now?”

“Yes, of course.” It’s not as though Victor can go on enjoying the flowers now—not with his beloved so distressed. So he folds up the blanket and offers an arm to Yuuri, steading his steps all the way back to his parents’ inn.

But Victor’s mind remains restless after, turning over the situation, looking at it from every possible angle. Because it can’t truly be a problem without a solution, can it?

“Yuuri isn’t the _only_ mind talent… is he?”

Yuuri’s mother freezes, from where she was boning a bird for supper. The neck snaps, just as the question leaves Victor’s lips.

“Ah… well…”

She looks away, nibbling on the seam of her lower lip. Toshiya holds a hand to her shoulder in a show of silent solidarity.

“There may be… one other.”

Victor drops his knife from where he was preparing vegetables. “Who?”

“She is…” Hiroko spirits some water from the sink over to wipe her hands. “She _was_ … my friend.”

“She still lives?”

“Yes, but…” She sighs, a full-bodied thing. “She was exiled. A long time ago.”

Victor pushes himself from the counter. “For what reason?”

“It’s…” Hiroko wrings her fingers. “It’s not my story to tell.”

“Does Yuuri know?”

“ _No._ ” Hiroko startles, the word coming out stronger than anything Victor has ever heard from her. “No… and please do not tell him. It would break his little heart, if he were to find out.”

Victor considers this. “But… it’s only right, isn’t it? He’s so alone in this world, with his troubles. To know he wasn’t a solitary figure in this fight to master his talent…”

She turns away, back to her bird. “Please… let us not speak of this again. Don’t allow my child to peer into a disastrous would-be future.”

Victor bites back the immediate impulse of wanting to correct her, of swearing on his very life that he wouldn’t dare let danger within an ocean’s-length of his Yuuri. But it’s wasted breath; he knows all too well that Hiroko wouldn’t hesitate to slit the throat of any threat to her son, and in that respect, they are very much on the same page.

Even so…

“Victor.”

Victor stops on the way to Yuuri’s room, his shadow long against the wall in the coming dusk.

Toshiya smiles, disarmingly. “I appreciate you wanting to help Yuuri in any way that you can. And I think you are right in searching out another mind talent—someone who might be able to mentor Yuuri, teach him more about himself.”

Victor waits.

The other sighs. “Hiroko is very… sensitive, when it comes to her, the mind talent. They grew up together, knew each other so well. Practically sisters, those two. She was even around briefly, when Yuuri was newly born. But she was gone before his talent had a chance to present itself. Ah, I wonder, what would she think of him now?” He chuckles, quietly. “Maybe you can help her too… to not feel so alone.”

“Then…” Victor turns all the way, to face him. “What are you saying?”  
  
Toshiya stalks forward, pressing a worn piece of paper into Victor’s hold, curling his fingers around it. “You can find her here. It’ll be a long journey… but I think it’s a necessary one.”

Victor tries not to crush the paper, in his eagerness. “Thank you, Father.” He bows his head to Toshiya, but the other man merely pulls him forward into his arms.

Yuuri’s father may not have the ability to read his thoughts, but in that moment, Victor feels, for one cosmic second, that they are of the exact same mind.

* * *

Victor leaves Yuuri confused, which is never how he wants to leave him. He never wants to leave Yuuri _ever_ , for that matter, but some circumstances can’t be helped. Yuuri clings to his hand even as Victor mounts his horse, eyes an earthy brown, not reading into Victor’s mind as Victor asked of him, for the time being.

“When will you be back?”

“Soon. I promise, my love.” Victor squeezes his hand, in reassurance. “I just have some business to attend to. I’ll make everything apparent when I get back.”

Yuuri nods, letting his fingers slip out of Victor’s. He reaches up around his neck, playing with the garnet betrothal necklace Victor placed there, just twenty-three years ago. “I miss you already.”  
  
Victor smiles, leaning down to run a thumb along the ridge of Yuuri’s ear. When he draws back, he’s left a snow flower there, tucked into the tresses of Yuuri’s hair. “And I, you, dearest.”

Toshiya didn’t lie when he insinuated the journey would be much. He has to leave Sealand entirely, following the coastline to where it meets the trees, forest and water fighting for dominion. The foliage grows wild here, gangly and sea-battered; the air tastes of ocean spray, strong gales displacing the sand where the trees do not break it up.

It’s remarkably quiet, save for the sound of waves crashing upon the shore.

He camps by the water, then takes a turn when he’s directed to, away from the ocean. The trees begin to bend inwards along the path then, their branches scraggly and thorned. Rain falls intermittently, dappling against the skin of Victor’s cheek; but it never lasts for long, passing over from one area to the other with the force of the wind.

At last, Victor comes to it: a cabin in the woods, nestled within a small clearing. It’s worn from centuries of salted air, but the smoke coming from the roof speaks of a current guest, tending to its upkeep. Victor dismounts his horse, tying it to a post in the front yard, and goes to knock upon the front door, his hand held before him.

But before he can, the door is yanked open, a knife thrust under his chin.

“What on the goddess’s green earth do you want?”

She’s an elf of small stature but an imposing aura, clothes tattered and bedraggled. Her hair is long, speaking to her age, but cut unevenly, wild strands left both short and long: the mark of an exile.

With his silence, Victor feels the tip of her blade press further into the lump in his throat. “Shouldn’t you know, mind talent?” he says, just managing to keep his tone from wavering. “Or am I perhaps mistaken on that front?”

Her keen eyes narrow. “I don't want inside your mind, boy. You look like the tiring sort.” She sheathes her knife, slowly, into a leather-bound belt, evidentially seeing no further threat in him. “And you can cut the attitude, child. Or you might just mysteriously contract a headache with no cure.”

Somehow, Victor can tell this is no idle threat.

“I deeply apologize. I didn’t mean to antagonize you. In fact, I came to you hoping you’d offer my partner some guidance.”

“Pfft, _guidance_!”

“Yes…? As I said.”

“You’ve come barking up the wrong tree.” She stalks back inside her house, dropping before a tea table. Embroidery lays strewn about her: a project, only about half finished, and frayed at the edges. “Now run along. I’ve no time for you.”

Victor takes a single step in, his foot creaking the old floors. “Would it mean anything at all if I said I came on behalf of Yuuri?”

She stops, from where she holds a needle to her craft. “Yuuri… of Sealand? Hiroko’s Yuuri?”

Victor fishes his betrothal necklace from beneath his collar, flashing the sapphire. “The very same.”

She only stares for a moment—at the sparkling blue gem, teetering back and forth—then slaps a hand to her face with a groan. “ _Of course_. Of course he would be a romantic, just like his mother.”

“You’re right; he is like his mother.” Victor takes this as an invitation, coming in to sit across from her. “But he’s also like you too.”

The elf fiddles with her sewing. “How so?”

“A mind talent.”

She draws blood upon the pad of one of her fingers, when the needle’s strike errs.

“I… did not know.”

“Now you do.”

She looks up at him finally, studying the contours of his face. Then all at once, her eyes flash a brilliant verdant green, lurid as the trees. _Ah, I see now_.

Victor startles, not used to having someone else in his mind. It feels a bit like he’s being unfaithful, somehow.

She folds her craft, unfolds it again. “So he’s having trouble with the noise, is he?”

“’The noise’?”

“That’s what I call it, anyway. The rabble. The thoughts of others, invading your mind.”

“Yes.” Victor leans forward, upon one hand. “Can it be stopped?”

“No.”

“’ _No_ ’?”

“Or if there is a way, I haven’t found it yet.”

“That’s… disappointing.”

“There are ways to make it better though.”

“Then—”

“Has he been able to draw out unconscious thoughts yet?”

“I’m sorry—?”

“When he reads you, from how far away can he do it?”

“We haven’t measured—”

“By the time I was his age, I could read someone from a mile off, sometimes more.”

“That’s—”

“I see.” Her eyes flicker again: that forest-green, swallowing him from the outside in. “So he hasn’t been trying to improve his talent.”

Victor tries to suppress a shiver from racing down his spine. The echo of her still lingers in his head, long after, and it’s not a pleasant feel. “We didn’t know there _was_ any way to improve it.”

“Hm.” She sips at a teacup, eyes keen over the ridge. “I’m not impressed.”

“My lady—ah, I haven’t caught your name yet—”

“That’s quite all right, Prince Victor of Woodland.”

He can't help but flinch, though he should have known better.

“It’s Minako, by the way,” she says, blasé. “Minako, formerly of Sealand. But I’m just Minako, now.”

“Minako, I implore you—” Victor prostrates himself as best he can before a table, with his hands to the grain. “—please take Yuuri under your wing. He needs to know he’s not alone—and I can only do so much.”

She studies him, tracing the outline of him. Her stare lingers on his hair, where it’s been cleanly cut to the nape. “You’ve done a lot for him already… but I fear I may be a poor teacher.”

“Please, teach him in any way that you can.”

“Hn. Very well then.” She stands, taking with her stained teacups to rinse them in the sink. “Bring him to me. I can’t very well been seen in Sealand, after all.”

“Thank you—”

“Be careful what you thank me for.”

All at once, a ruckus comes from the second-story of the cabin; a gaggle of human children come barreling down the stairs, one on top of the other.

“Minako, Minako!”

“I told you to stay upstairs,” she tells them, tone exceedingly world-weary.

They evidently don’t care to hear her out, rolling and wrestling and yelping like wild wolf pups.

Minako evidently reads the question off Victor’s face, if not directly from his mind. “Orphans. Those that get lost in the woods… or are left there. They leave, after a time. I merely make sure they get fed.”

Victor thinks she surely does a lot more than that, considering the ease in which they take to cleaning and reading and sewing: whatever is out, at the moment.

He leaves Minako on the front porch then, flanked by the children. They wave as he retreats, solidifying Victor’s intent to be back within the blink of an elven eye.

* * *

Victor is terrible at keeping secrets, and Yuuri is equally terrible at waiting for surprises.

It makes perfect sense. Decades of Yuuri reading Victor’s mind has made it all a bit moot, after all, the two being open books to each other. But Victor is determined to keep _this_ secret, _this_ surprise; because it will all be worth it in the end, he thinks, to see Yuuri’s reaction.

Doesn’t stop Yuuri from wondering though—and often aloud.

“What is even out here?”

Yuuri looks towards the tree line, with big, curious eyes. The waters aren’t enchanted here as they are in Sealand; the waves do not part for Yuuri, as he directs his horse through them.

“I told you, it’s a surprise,” Victor says, glancing over his shoulder. “You’ll know soon enough.”

Yuuri makes a deeply unhappy noise, but he acquiesces, biting into his lip to avoid searching through Victor’s thoughts for the answer.

After a while of being ensconced in the forest, the cabin comes into view. And of course, they’re hardly dismounted from their horses when the door opens, Minako stepping out, leaning back against the doorframe.

_Who—?_

_You’re—_

Minako and Yuuri give twin noises of anguish as their talents clash, fighting for space within each other’s mental planes.

“Ooh…” Minako groans, squeezing at the bridge of her nose. “I always did wonder what would happen, if two mind talents were to read each other at once.”

“Wait.” Yuuri clutches at his head. “So you’re also…?”

“Yes.” Minako beckons, with one hand. “Come inside, come inside. It’s beginning to storm.”

And a gale is indeed stirring, so Yuuri and Victor quickly take her up on the offer.

“I…” Yuuri looks down into a cup of tea, freshly brewed for him. “I thought I was the only one.”

“So did I.” Minako pours another, sliding it across the way to Victor. “But you partner was determined to have us meet.”

Yuuri takes Victor’s hand into his lap, gratefully.

Minako looks at him up and down then, a finger stroking at her chin. “You really did grow to look like your mother.”

“You knew my mother?”

“Pfft, _knew_.” Minako sips at her own tea, obnoxiously. “We were inseparable, back in the day—not to mention, _infamous_. Sparring partners-turned-fighting duo, Hiroko and Minako: water and mind, a deadly combination. We competed in the talent competitions every year, and we always ended up towards the very top.”

Yuuri can’t conceal his awe, hands clutched together like a child being regaled by tales of the fantastical. “That’s amazing! I’ve never been allowed to compete! They say mind has no place on the battlefield.”

“Oh, is _that_ what they say now.” Minako scowls, deep into her cup. “Those bastards.”

“I’m sorry…?”

Minako stands, abruptly. “I don’t want to talk about it now. Not… Just not now.” She waves her hand, warily. “Why not go rest up from your trip? We can discuss things more tomorrow.”  
  
Yuuri looks as though a nap is the very last thing on his mind, but he gives in, for now. “Yes… All right.” He takes Victor with him, up the stairs. “Good night.”

She says nothing—just leans heavily on the kitchen counter, something invisible weighing fiercely between the length of her shoulders.

* * *

There are no extra rooms upstairs, it turns out, so Victor and Yuuri end up sharing a space with the children, all strewn about on straw beds in the attic. Yuuri wakes to a few of said children tugging on his hair, weaving flowers into his braids.

Victor lies beside him, propped up on an elbow, with an exceedingly fond grin threatening to overtake him. “Good morning, beautiful.”

“I…” Yuuri nearly goes cross-eyed, to see who exactly is styling his hair. “I suppose it is.” The humans giggle at him, an especially young one pulling at one of his pointed ears.

“Shall we go out to seek our host?”

“I guess we should.”

The children scatter when Yuuri rises, running out of the room with pitched giggles. Yuuri tilts his head at this, perplexed. “Do they think me odd?”

“The only elf they’ve ever seen is Minako.” Victor strokes his hair, tucking the flowers in tighter. “And me, briefly. They’re probably just curious.”

“Hm,” Yuuri hums. “I see.”

They end up finding Minako in the barn, an offshoot of the cabin. She’s feeding their horses, as well as her own.  
  
“Well,” she says, propping a heel up on the wooden fence, “are you ready for training?”

Yuuri blinks. “Training…?”

Minako looks past Yuuri, to glare at Victor. “You didn’t tell him?”

“Ah, well…” Victor holds his hands up, shakes them a little. “Surprise…?”

Yuuri and Minako both sigh, one undoubtably far more fond than the other.

* * *

“Yuuri!” Minako calls from across the way. “Can you read Victor now?"

_My Yuuri._

“Crystal clear!”

“Take another ten paces!”

Yuuri does, and the children follow at his heel, laying out branches of roughly the same length behind him upon the forest floor. They’re lacking the proper equipment to measure for this kind of thing, but the improvisation works well enough, for the time being.

“And now?”

_Yuuri._

“Yes!”

“Another ten!”

They repeat the process many times over, until Yuuri loses sight of them over a crest of a hill. Even then, Minako communicates to him in his mind, and the experiment continues.

_Now?_

_Yuu—_

_Hm?_

_Yuu—?_

_I can hardly hear him now, Teacher._

_“Hardly”? How hardly?_

_Just the first part of my name._

_All right. Take one pace and try again._

Yuuri does, and Victor’s thoughts become that much quieter, though he can still make him out. They do it a handful more times—one pace at a time—until Yuuri can no longer reach him at all.

_Good. Stay right where you are._

Yuuri tries to communicate his affirmation but finds he can’t reach Minako either, at this distance.

It takes a long time for Minako and Victor to meet up with him, the former counting the sticks along the forest floor as she goes. By the time Yuuri can see them again, she’s got a tally going, keeping track of it by writing it on the ground, every ten feet or so.

“Four thousand one hundred eighty-seven,” she reports, after counting the last stick. “Roughly… four-fifths of a mile.” She taps her fingers together, thinkingly. “I must say, that’s better than I thought you would do, considering how lackadaisical you’ve been with your training.”

“Thank you—?”

“Well—” Minako looks to the children. “—ready to do it again?”

They cheer, scattering to gather more sticks, making a contest out of it.

Well, Yuuri thinks, at least someone is having fun throughout this process.

* * *

“What fruit am I thinking of?”

“Pear.”

“Wrong.”

“But—”

“I’m _tricking you_ , Yuuri. Look under my surface thoughts. Dig deep.”

“I’m _trying_.”

“Not hard enough. Again! What fruit?”

“P… pear?”

“ _No_.”

“But you said—”

“Now it’s under two layers. You have to keep up.”

“Teacher—”

“Now it’s under three.”

“How—?”

“ _Fruit?_ ”

“Fine! Peach!”

Mianko smirks. “Good. Now again.”

* * *

“All right, little ones,” Minako says. “I want you all to close your eyes for me. Good, good. Now I want you to picture a _big_ white dog. Can you see it? Picture it. Look _very_ closely.”

“Ah…” Yuuri starts to feel it: the thoughts emanating from the children. A large wolf-like creature, with a foaming mouth and bloodshot eyes.

“I know, Yuuri.” Minako comes before him, holding both hands to the sides of his head. “I feel it too. Breathe for me. Yes, good. Breathe, take that thought and replace it with another.”

“Like what?” Yuuri says, and he hates how his tone warbles, on the edge of tears.

“Something similar. Like, if not a big white dog, perhaps a small white rabbit. Something harmless, friendly.”

Yuuri tries, trading the dog’s fangs for blunt teeth, its coarse fur for soft down. His breathing levels out, even as the image of the dog paces at the edge of his mind, looking for an opening.

“Good. Yes, very good, Yuuri.”

“Can I stop now?”

“I suppose.” Minako looks over her shoulder. “All right, kids. Take five.”

* * *

Yuuri wakes in the middle of the night, very much convinced something is awry. He sits up, turns his head this way and that, but the house is silent; the children sleep in piles, curled up together, and his husband slumbers on soundly as well, save for an arm he has wrapped tightly around Yuuri’s middle.

Then Yuuri hears it—no, _reads_ it: the thoughts of someone, garbled and irritated. He sheds his blanket, extracting himself from under Victor to go inspect.

When Yuuri descends the stairs, he locates the source—or rather, part of the source. It’s Minako, but only the top part of her head is visible as she rummages through a cellar built into the kitchen floor, cursing under her breath all the while.

“Need some help?”

“ _Goddess_ —” She fumbles a bottle, managing only just not to drop it. “I haven’t been sneaked up upon in _centuries_.” She climbs halfway up the cellar stairs, sliding herself into a sitting position before it. “But your mental blocks are getting quite good, I’ll give you that.”

“Thank you. Why are you up so late?”

“Ah—” Minako deposits a couple bottles upon the floor next to her. “—just felt like drinking, that’s all. Care to join me? I’ve got rice wine, grape, blueberry—or if you’d rather, a little smoke? There’s quality herbs everywhere around her.”  
  
“Oh, no, that’s all right.” Yuuri folds his fingers together, abashedly. “I’m trying not to do such things anymore.”

“’Anymore’? You’re still young! What are you, eight hundred?”

“Seven hundred ninety-three.”

“Young enough to still be keeping track.” Minako hoists herself up. “I honestly can’t remember when I was born. A little before your mother, I think, but don’t go getting any ideas! I’m still as spry as I was a millennium ago.” She sits, pours herself a deep red liquor. The scent is distinct: elderberry and something that reminds Yuuri of the snap of winter air. “Well, come on now. Join me.”

Yuuri sits, folds one leg over the other. He pulls at a crease in his nightgown, biting into his lip as he mulls over how to phrase the question that’s been eating at him, ever since he arrived.

“It was a political issue.”

Yuuri jerks his head up, startled. Minako’s eyes are a deep, deep jade.

She quirks a smile, wry. “You should know there’s no secrets, when it comes to us.” She takes a long pull, from her wine. “In the end, it’s always politics, you know? I was already a big name being the only mind talent around, but then Hiroko and I… Well, we became rather infamous. It was probably stupid of me, to be so brazen about it. If I could do it all again, I’d keep my head down, but… you can’t change the past.”

She pauses, swirls her glass. “I guess it started just before you were born. The situation between elves and orcs was starting to get a bit dicey on the northern border of Sealand. The king and queen enlisted my help, as a trump card of sorts. It worked marvelously, I must say, but then… Oh, if I was famous before, I was downright _notorious_ then.”

She tips her glass, this way and that. “Then everyone wanted a piece of me. A little me in Sunland, a little me in Sealand—and yes, a little me in Woodland. I was _quite familiar_ with Victor’s parents back then. Cutthroat pair, those two. Be careful, if you ever do go back.”

“I will.”

“Anyway—” She sighs, runs a thumb along a muscle in the back of her neck. “—it ended up being a point of contention between the ruling families. Elves haven’t seriously fought amongst ourselves in… goddess, I’m not sure you could find someone who could remember. But it’s a hard fact to forget that the strongest enemy to an elf is another elf. And…” She blinks. Swallows. “Everyone wanted the trump card.”

“You became a pawn.”  
  
“Essentially, yes. My freedom was gone, being reduced to a shiny object to fight over. I got sick of it. In the end, it was my decision to choose banishment. I told them: If not everyone can have me, then _no one_ can have me. They agreed—but in exchange, I had to promise never to ally myself with another elven kingdom, as that would be seen as an act of war. And so I left, never to return.”

She’s quiet then. Contemplative. “I imagine that’s why your mother never told you about me. She didn’t want you to… end up like this. Though it seems the monarchies are trying to avoid that option themselves as well, discouraging you from learning how to fight using your talent. I can… see the logic in it, admittedly, even if it irks me.”

Yuuri reaches across the table, placing a hand over Minako’s. “I’m sorry you’ve gone through all this—and all alone too.”

“Eh, it’s not so bad.” Minako takes another drink. “I’ve got a nice cabin here. The children keep me plenty busy. And now… you’re here, so I can pass on my knowledge to you, what little good it will do you.”

“It’s done me a lot of good already.”

“Is that so?” Minako smiles: the first genuine one Yuuri thinks he’s seen from her. “Then I’m glad.”

* * *

Yuuri and Victor end up staying the year. Summer crickets pass by, then autumn leaves and snowfall. The children grow taller; Yuuri’s talent grows greater. It’s only when spring returns again that Yuuri begins to feel homesick for his parents and sister, for the magicked waters of Sealand. Victor wants to depart at once—hearing that—but Yuuri tells him to wait, that there is something he must do first.

They leave briefly, then return with someone in tow.

The door to Minako’s cabin opens, with a slow whine.

“Mina-chan?”

Minako drops a plate, from where she was drying it.

“Hiro-chan?”

They take steps towards each other like they’ve never walked before, falling into each other’s arms at the threshold. They run hands down each other, chatter excitedly about everything and nothing at all.

And all the while from the doorway, Yuuri and Victor look on.

**Author's Note:**

> I promise I'll write how they got engaged and married (both times) someday.


End file.
